


Stolen Jacket

by slightlyworriedhuman



Series: Synesthete Jeremy [2]
Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Jeremy doesn't know how to deal with feelings, Synesthesia, also the colours and feelings are based on my own syn, and Brooke just cares about him, depressing?, so don't kill me for having colours wrong haha
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-24 08:57:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12009375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slightlyworriedhuman/pseuds/slightlyworriedhuman
Summary: Sometimes, it's easy for feelings to drag you down, especially when they feel like a lead blanket over you.or, Jeremy doesn't know how to deal with feelings sometimes. Brooke is there to help.





	Stolen Jacket

Feelings, emotions, things of that sort were odd colours. There was the word for an emotion— anger, sadness, joy, confusion. The words themselves rang of their own colour, regardless of the emotion meant to be portrayed. There was the concept of the emotion, described in books and poems as if detailing a bird seen while hiking. His idea of a character’s emotion would always be a flat colour, two-dimensional and monochromatic. Then there was the actual emotion, the physical sensation of feeling. The red pull of happiness on his face and throat, the dim yet pale yellow of confusion that laced through his temples and wrists, the dull pink-and-grey of panic that would pierce his lungs and wrap around his spine. 

Right now, all he could feel was a dull grey-blue, edges rounded with a pale cream, damping down everything else. It felt like a half-there-half-not sheet, draping over him and catching on his mind, his jaw, his shoulders, pulling them down as if it were increasing the gravity on his bony limbs, as if the sky was sinking onto his back. It flowed over his body, weighing down his feet, catching on his long fingers as he tried to move them, sapping them of energy and mobility and dragging them down. He still hadn’t found the word for that particular feeling 

_(depression)_

_(exhaustion)_

_(weariness)_

yet. 

At times like this, he didn’t really know what to do. Nothing seemed to work to combat it, nothing staved it off. The only thing he could ever think of to do was to turn on music, to sit, to try to tint the sheet with some other colour in the faintest hope of lightening the pull. Excuse himself from class or lunch or whatever his friends had planned and hide, be it in an empty classroom or in the tiny woods of the park or in his room or just outside the school, hunched against a wall, twisted inside a stolen jacket to block out the light. 

Sighing slightly, he sluggishly tried to readjust the jacket, pulling the ends of the sleeves further over his hands. The light filtering between the clouds looked almost as grey as he felt, the trees and grass looking as though the chill in the air was sapping out the bright colours and leaving naught but shadows of the former hues. In his headphones, light-blue duplicates of Michael’s, soft music played, pale yellow and autumnal colours humming into his ears brighter than the leaves in sight. Despite the bright shades, the feeling draping over him didn’t shift, didn’t lighten at all. Closing his eyes and pulling his knees closer to his chest, he softly laid his face on them, the slight pressure of his bony knees pushing against his eyes uncomfortable yet soothing. Everything felt so heavy. 

A slight gust pushed against the fabric of his stolen jacket, then a light pressure on his shin. Raising his head just enough to free his eyelids, he peered up. Crouching before him, arm extended to push her fingers gently against his leg, was Brooke, soft concern on her face. With no small effort, he raised his hand and pushed his headphones back, a small shiver rippling through his body as the movement allowed a breeze to enter the unzipped jacket and push against his torso. 

"Hey, Jere. Whatcha doing out here?” He shrugged, the simple act of raising his shoulders feeling more exhausting than it had any right to. Shifting her weight, she turned, scooting so she was against the wall beside Jeremy. Still focusing on where she had been, his eyes readjusted to view the trees, dull leaves scratching in the wind with faint rusty hues. “You doing okay?” 

Exhaling heavily, he murmured, “I don't know. I… I don't know. I don’t feel right.” 

"What do you mean?” Another shrug, slow and laborious. 

"I just don't … feel like I should.” 

"Well, what do you feel like?” she asked. He heard her shift again next to him, then felt her hand settle on his back, rubbing soft circles into the fabric. A comforting weight, as opposed to the feeling dragging him down. Pausing, he tried to find the appropriate words. 

"It’s like… heavy. Just this heavy, grey and blue and pale thing--” --he gestured abstractly, carving a general shape of the feeling draping over him into the air-- “-- just over me, and it just… it makes it hard to, to move, or think, or…” He sighed again, letting his face sink back onto his knees. “It’s so _heavy._ ” They sat in silence for a minute. Finally, she questioned, “What do you normally do when this happens?” The calluses on her palms kept catching slightly on the fabric of the jacket as the slid her hand over his back, hardened skin catching the thread and pulling it ever so slightly before it fell back to its original place on his form. Distracted by the rhythm of her hand gliding back and forth, it took him a moment to even process her question. 

"I don’t really… do _anything_. There's nothing _to_ do. Nothing ever changes it.” Brooke’s hand paused for a moment before resuming the circular motion. 

"You just wait it out?” Jeremy nodded. Silence fell over them again, the only thing audible quiet breaths and the rust of distant leaves scratching against each other as another soft breeze wove through them. A hushed sigh, then she shifted again beside him. “Can I wait with you?” Taken aback, he turned his head, opening his eyes and peering at her around his knees. She gazed at him patiently, hand settling on his back as she waited. 

"Don't you have class?” She shrugged. 

"You're more important than English, Jere.” She turned her head to the trees. “This is still my favourite place behind the school. Even if I can't help, I'd rather be here with you.” Another gust of wind blew against them, and he watched her blonde hair flick across her face, her yellow jacket flapping against the brick wall. She seemed like the only thing the damp air couldn't leech the colour from, couldn't fade. 

"...Okay.” She nodded, and lapsed back into silence for a moment before removing her hand from his back and straightening her legs. 

"Here. You can lay on me.” Gratefully, he murmured a small thank you and shifted so he could gently lay his head in her lap. “Do you want your headphones back on?” He nodded, and her fingers pressed against his neck for a moment before pulling his headphones back over his ears. His unpaused music immediately filled his ears again, the same autumn colours standing out again in stark contrast to the washed-out trees. Her fingers gently tangled in his hair, and he sighed, pulling his knees close to him. Gazing at the tops of the trees, the leaves forming a jagged horizon line against the clouds, Jeremy let himself sink against the ground, against Brooke, letting the sheet of 

_(fatigue)_

_(despair)_

_(depression)_

something pull him down, oh so heavy against his bones. Sometimes, there was nothing to do about these feelings. All he could really do was curl up with a stolen jacket and dimly appreciate the people who cared.

**Author's Note:**

> more are on the way! this was supposed to be a sweet one about his feelings for Michael but then I started feeling like this rip I'll do fluffy ones later
> 
> tumblr: @richieandthevoices, hmu over there!


End file.
